


Could of had it all

by brittlestars



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Foggy Nelson Is a Good Bro, Gen, Landman and Zack, M/M, Marci ships Matt/Foggy and so do I, foggy nelson could have been a butcher
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-16
Updated: 2019-11-16
Packaged: 2021-01-31 14:04:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21447418
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brittlestars/pseuds/brittlestars
Summary: Foggy and Matt were both fish out of water at Landman & Zack, but at least they were each other's fish.
Relationships: Matt Murdock & Franklin "Foggy" Nelson, Matt Murdock/Franklin "Foggy" Nelson
Comments: 12
Kudos: 81
Collections: Daredevil Bingo





	Could of had it all

Foggy guided Matt through the revolving door. "Here we are, Matty. We did it. We've _arrived._"

Matt squeezed Foggy's elbow. An unspoken undercurrent passed between them: their long hours of late night study sessions, the missed dates and social opportunities neglected to instead stay in their room, holed up and working, were worth it. All of it was worth it. They were lawyers, and they were going to help the little guy. 

Foggy stopped just inside the doorway. Matt, trailing, bumped into his shoulder softly. Foggy inhaled, craning his neck up to take in the high ceiling, the marble, the sleek glass and cold steel. 

"Matty..."

Matt leaned in, making the gesture appear like an effort to move out of the way of the stream of office workers pouring in the doors. It wasn't for them. 

"Tell me," Matt urged, a secret voice just for Foggy's ear. 

Foggy grinned. He lived for this. Also for justice, and for family, and for well-cured meats, sure, but telling Matt about the world they'd worked for, earned? He could describe it all day.

He looked around, then reached for Matt's free hand. Matt obligingly shifted his cane. Foggy turned them in a slow half-circle, murmuring. "Well, morning light has a kinda warm color. Smoggy but soft. It makes everything a bit yellow. We're in the entrance, and what an entrance it is. You missed the 'Landman and Zack' sign outside the door; it was totally the biggest of all the signs, but the way, but I bet we can do better. They went for gold instead of brass, which: tacky much?" 

Matt ducked his head, not quite hiding his smile. 

Foggy swept their intertwined hands wide. "Anyhow, the fabled, prestigious, hallowed halls of Landman & Zack... are actually exactly like every other boring corporate high rise." 

"You expected gilded floors? Justice herself sweeping through the halls, robes billowing?" Came a snide voice. "Do you have any idea how law firms actually work?"

Somehow the young white guy in an immaculate business suit managed to trip over Matt's cane as he hurried by. 

Foggy inhaled a sharp breath, a half-second from launching into one of his famous retorts, but Matt squeezed his hand in reassurance and shifted his weight forward. "Sorry," Matt said, "didn't see you."

The man did a double-take and then flustered, stepping back and stuttering. Foggy would have laughed at Matt's old trick, if he weren't so angry. At least this guy wasn't Landman, Zack, or one of the partners. Of that, Foggy was quite sure. He did his research.

Matt extended his hand in roughly the correct direction. Foggy leaned just a bit and Matt readjusted accordingly. "I'm Matt Murdock."

The man hesitated a fraction of a second longer than was polite, staring at Matt's outstretched hand. "I'm a new intern here," Matt clarified. When the man rolled his eyes, Matt let his hand drop, untouched.

Foggy stepped forward, smile like a peace offering. "And I'm Fog-- Franklin Nelson." Matt frowned heavily at Foggy's self-censoring.

The guy barely spared Foggy a glance. "Some advice, one intern to another: Move at corporate speed or get pushed out of the way." As if to illustrate, he brushed past Foggy and Matt toward the elevators.

"Don't mind Buck," chided a familiar voice, punctuated by the click of heels. Foggy turned to see Marci. She was wearing a smart pantsuit and a narrow, lethal smile. It was a familiar smile, and also a beautiful smile, because practically everything about Marci was beautiful. "Squaring with him is not worth the effort. Hello, Matt." She cast a meaningful glance from Matt to Foggy, to Matt's hand on Foggy's elbow. 

Foggy ignored the dance of Marci's eyes, the implied question there. Instead, he asked, "That dude's name is Buck? Seriously?"

Marci snorted, derisive. 

"Buck, like a deer?" Foggy continued, shaking his head. 

"He may be an idiot but he knows how to play the game. A memorable name might get him noticed." She squeezed Foggy's upper arm, the arm not cradled in Matt's hand. "L and Z is a big place. Don't get your pretty head lost, _Franklin._"

"Bye, Marci," Matt chimed, turning the side with a deliberate tug on Foggy's elbow. 

"Bye, boys." Marci trotted over to the glut of sharply-dressed folks waiting for the elevator. She greeted a pair of people, slotting herself directly into their conversation.

"She's hot when she's condescending," Foggy reported dutifully. 

Matt groaned and shifted on his feet, antsy. "You always think she's hot, Fogs."

Foggy shrugged and began walking again. "Fair enough. But that last comment was a bit insulting." He paused mid-sentence, turning to Matt and causing the steady stream of office workers to move around them like a tide around an island. "She knows we're better than that. Right?"

"Of course. And she knows we know. Insults are her version of a friendly hello." 

Foggy glanced over his shoulder back toward Marci. She didn't look back at them. Foggy snorted. "I guess."

Matt was dismissive. "You usually don't let her get under your skin. You're... better that way." Foggy's heart fluttered. 

"Wasn't expecting her, I guess." He cast one last look after Marci. The elevator had arrived. Buck was holding the door for her as she finished her conversation, much to the visible annoyance of the other passengers.

Matt hummed, noncommittal. It was enough to regain Foggy's attention, and he steered them toward the stairwell. It would be a long hike up to the third floor, but Foggy told himself it would be good for his health. He knew Matt-I-have-a-perfect-body-Murdock wouldn't complain.

On the way up, Foggy restarted his narration. "Okay, so the columns here _are_ impressive, even if they are kinda tacky," he admitted. Falling back into the familiar routine of narrating worked wonders to reduce his stress. Matt smiled.

By the time they met the office manager, Jorge, at the third floor reception area, Foggy had spun a truly outlandish description of decor that looked "like Art Deco unicorn vomit, Matt, I don't know what else to tell you." 

Jorge shook their hands, got the secretary to give them their ID cards, and began to give them a quick rundown of the layout of the floor verbally before awkwardly interrupting himself to offer to walk Matt around the space. Matt demurred, reassuring Jorge that he was more than capable of learning the layout on his own. 

"I'm sure Franklin can help you." 

Matt did not acknowledge the slight to his independence, keeping his tiny smile neutral, politely detached. "Of course." Jorge seemed relieved to find someone else to pawn the task onto, seemingly unaware that he had negated Matt's assurances that there was no need to assign anyone the task in the first place. 

Matt and Foggy were assigned a tiny closet of a workspace and told to wait there for further instruction. Apparently Jorge was the closest they would get to meeting Landman, Zack, or any of the other associates for the first half of the day. 

As they settled in, Foggy could tell Matt had something on his mind. 

"What is it, Matt?"

"Hmm?" Matt was running his hands around the edges of their sprawling shared desk. He didn't turn in Foggy's direction.

"Matt."

"It's nothing, Foggy."

"Buddy, I know you think you've got an amazing poker face but please, just humor me. I am already stressed out enough by this place; I need to know you've got my back."

Finally, Matt gave up on his excuse of learning the exact dimensions of the desk. His voice was low and steady. "I've always got your back. Always." 

Foggy waved the words away. "And?"

"You put your name down as Franklin on the paperwork?" Matt frowned. 

"It is my name."

Matt approximated a stare. It was intimidating, the way he went still and didn't move even when he'd successfully gotten Foggy to divert his gaze.

Foggy sighed, slumping back in his chair. "This is a professional workplace. I am a professional. Franklin sounds more professional."

"Whatever you say, Fogs."

Foggy hadn't gone by "Franklin" since before grade school, and only Matt ever called him "Fogs." He definitely didn't want Matt to stop calling him that. But he was suddenly glad that he hadn't corrected Jorge's use of "Franklin," because what if Marci was right? What if this place was going to change them? It was better to declare the boundaries pre-emptively than to have some corporation strip him of his name when he was just an intern.

Besides, they were Foggy and Matt; whatever changes they might individually make to advance at Landman & Zack, it would take a hell of a lot more than some stuffy workplace to put a rift in their friendship. Nothing could take away Matt calling him "Fogs." Ever.

Onboarding consisted of several brief but intense days of orientation, including extensive nondisclosure agreements and non-competition agreements, various trainings, and two harrowing meetings where a panel of junior partners took them each into a room (Matt had insisted Foggy go first, the jerk, though it had felt nice to know Matt was waiting right outside in the hall in silent moral support) and grilled them on their expertise and background in the particulars of corporations as individuals in civil suit defense. They must have passed whatever test it was, because, at the end of the week, Matt and Foggy were finally assigned their first task by none other than their very good friend, Buck. 

Buck provided the list of requirements on a printed piece of paper, highlighting important items according to some inscrutable three-color scheme. He did not provide an electronic or Braille version, seemed to have come down to the third floor specifically to show them just how important it was that they complete each item on the list to his exacting specifications. Matt and Foggy listened as Buck gave the instructions in small words, "just to be sure you understand." Neither of them took notes and neither of them had follow-up questions, which made Buck narrow his eyes before turning suddenly and sweeping out the door with an "I expect it on my desk tomorrow morning, 8 o'clock."

Matt scowled after Buck as if he could actually glare daggers into his back.

Foggy snorted. "Whatever. As if he doesn't know all the good bagels are gone by 7AM."

Matt let slip a ghost of a smile at that. They turned to their computers and got to work, only speaking to each other to confirm division of labor and coordinate compilation of sources. And when one of them thought of a particularly juicy pun.

They submitted the report early, with additional sources, an appendix, and commentary on further lines of inquiry. Buck sneered - actually sneered - when he noticed the commentary. "I asked for facts, not your opinions," he said. 

"If it's too much, I can give you a summary. I could even color-code it, if you like." 

Buck's head snapped up and he narrowed his eyes, considering Foggy's facial expression. Foggy's smile was warm and earnest, but his eyes held a hard glint. Just as Buck's face was shading toward red, Jorge walked by and Foggy turned, waving. 

"Matt, Jorge's here." 

"Good morning, Jorge." Matt pronounced their manager's name perfectly, because of course he did.

"Good morning, Matt, Franklin. You're here early."

"We were just waiting to drop this off with Buck, to make sure everything was as exactly as requested."

"Good, good," Jorge nodded absently, striding away.

Buck tossed the report into the empty "in" tray on his immaculate desk. "If you'll excuse me," he ground out, "I have an important meeting to attend. I'll have the secretary send down your next set of tasks."

The secretary's name was MacKenzie, and she liked tiger lilies, rainy days, and All Blacks rugby. But Foggy doubted Buck knew any of that.

"Sure thing, Buck. We'll get right to it."

But Buck had already walked off. 

From then on, Matt and Foggy's tasks came by email. Really, it was much easier for everyone that way. And certainly more pleasant. 

After another few weeks, they'd settled into a routine of countless hours of compiling research and reading reports punctuated by the occasional meeting. Matt and Foggy were starting to see the pieces they were allowed to glimpse coming together into the bigger picture of a case. It was a big case, an important and complex case. In their down time (which was admittedly rare, and usually amounted to walking back to one of their apartments, or to Josie's, together later in the evening) they speculated aloud. Neither of them liked where their ideas were pointing, but Foggy insisted that it was all just speculation, anyway, and they were only interns, what did they know? They were not allowed to hear the behind-closed-doors plans. Matt would get quiet and broody, but didn't argue. 

One Tuesday afternoon, Marci appeared at their office-closet, announced only by the click of her designer footwear.

"I heard Buck complaining about babysitting, so I thought I'd drop by."

Foggy scowled. 

"Aww..." Marci gave a mock pout, then laughed. "Foggy-- Am I allowed to call you Foggy yet?"

"Whatever." 

Marci nodded her approval, not that Foggy needed it. "Good. Now, tell me: Buck's not pawning all of his work off on you two, is he? Because I detected a sudden and unexpected increase in the quality of his summaries." 

"Aw, Marce, you care?"

She blinked. "No. I just don't want to look bad by comparison."

"You'd never look bad."

Marci hummed. "Agreed there. Maybe you are learning. But still," she inhaled, "you two, somehow, are a powerhouse. That shouldn't be denied. Get your name on your work. Or, barring that, at least give it to me instead of the enemy."

"Aren't we all on the same side?" Matt asked, voice dry. 

Marci turned to Foggy. "Aw, Foggy. I think I understand what you see in him. It's the naivety, isn't it?"

Foggy felt an oncoming train of a migraine. "Marci--"

"Don't worry, I'll see myself out, leave you two to your alone time. But first, boys, I'll say this one last time: you're going to have to be cutthroat to make it. Don't let fools like Buck take advantage of you."

"She's still hot," Foggy said without any real fervor. Then, after a pause listening to the sound of her heels fading down the hall, he continued. "Do we really belong here?"

"Marci seems to think our research is acceptable."

"I was supposed to be a butcher."

"No. Enough of that, Foggy. You're right where you're supposed to be." Matt reached over the desk. He groped for, found, and squeezed Foggy's shoulder.

"Right. Divine providence and all that..."

"Don't knock your own hard work getting here."

"'God helps those who help themselves'?"

"Something like that."

"Well, let's get to work helping ourselves then."

Matt swept out a hand. "I'll follow your lead."

Foggy and Matt were no strangers to the hard work and long hours demanded of them at Landman & Zack. The pay was a pittance but hey, they had to start chipping away at crushing debt somehow. And there were free bagels. But even as the weeks turned to months and they dug themselves out from under Buck's direct supervision to claim a small corner of the program for themselves, the routine of Landman & Zack never became quite comfortable. The plastic dinosaurs earned dirty looks from visitors to their tiny space, almost as many as Foggy's shaggy hair when he grew it out again. Matt encouraged him to keep it long every time Foggy threatened to cut it off. 

They were good. Even all the imposter syndrome in the world wasn't enough to blur away the fact that, as a team, Nelson and Murdock could handle whatever research task was thrown their way with diligence and a sort of grace that none of the other interns quite managed. Some grumbled that it was unfair that they had a tag-team working, but hey, that's business. They were already partners and would be 'til the end. Teamwork through friendship granted a subtle confidence, a bolstering against the distracted scramblings of the other interns who rushed to show off and impress, subtly sabotaging one another where they thought they could get away with it. Instead, Matt and Foggy were comfortable, retreating into each other, plans and schemes eerily in-sync, complementary in the best possible ways.

It got them noticed. Praise from the bosses, glares from the other interns who'd been around longer. Buck moved on to softer prey. 

Foggy didn't mention the glares; Matt didn't need to know. It was a small thing, but he could afford that much discretion on Matt's behalf, especially as it became clearer that Matt was not comfortable at Landman & Zack. Not so much because of the blindness or even because of being an orphan, or a fiercely religious person in corporate Manhattan. No, it was Matt's poise, his equanimity, his rock-solid unshakableness. It unsettled the legal eagles and fresh interns alike. And it drew Foggy like a magnet, like a dove seeking a warm and sheltered place to rest her feathered bosom.

Only strangers questioned why two teamed up, why ferocious Matt deigned keep someone so soft-looking by his side, why Foggy let himself be "dragged down" by a blind man. Foggy and Matt both had a core of steel, exposed only when it came to justice, to righteousness. It wasn't hidden, _per se_. It was, after all, their driving passion, what they bonded over more deeply than anything. Their mutual downtrodden, Hell's Kitchen background never quite rubbed off. They were each a fish out of water, sure, but they were each other's fish. 

And then the day came. Foggy and Matt knew by that point that they were assisting with background research in defense of the Roxxon corporation. Roxxon happened to be Landman & Zack's largest client. Roxxon also happened to be an evil heartless international empire conducting shady business practices "six ways to Sunday," as Foggy's dad would have said. 

The backstabbing from other interns they could handle. The not-so-quietly-muttered homophobic slurs seemed to roll off Matt completely unnoticed. They weathered the mixed praise from the higher-ups, goading them to be more vicious even as they were diligent and thorough, impressively so. 

What Matt couldn't handle was defending slime like Roxxon. He was making an effort to contain his rage, but Foggy saw through Matt's clenched jaw, the twisting tick of his white-knuckled grip on his cane during meetings, the way he declined going for cheap bar food with Foggy so he could box for hours and hours at this dad's old gym. Each of Matt's increasingly common tells caused Foggy to sigh and pinch his brow and try not to envision his imaginary future penthouse apartment dissolving into smoke and blowing away in the Manhattan breeze. 

"Lucky for us," Buck was saying across the wooden expansive of the meeting room table, "The DA's office just doesn't have the resources available to the esteemed offices of Landman & Zack. We'll have a favorable outcome for our client by the end of the month."

Most of the other interns nodded. One of the newer ones was actually talking notes, the idiot.

Matt stood abruptly and walked out without a word, stalking through the doorway with hardly a sweep of his cane. Foggy glanced after Matt, then looked to Buck, who grinned. 

Foggy sighed, shut his blank notebook, and walked out of the conference room. It was only a meeting of interns, but he still saw his future evaporating when he closed his eyes. 

Matt was nowhere to be found in the hall, but Marci was waiting for an elevator.

"Pretty boy took the stairs," she said by way of greeting.

"I thought I was the cute one," Foggy muttered. 

"Never said you weren't. Though you are much cuter when you smile." She said it deadpan and Foggy didn't have the energy to unravel that particular mystery right now. 

The elevator arrived, disgorging several distracted-looking paralegals. Foggy and Marci stepped aside to let them pass before climbing aboard. It was just the two of them but Marci stood closer to Foggy than strictly necessary.

"What's he mad about this time?"

"Our guilty client," Foggy gritted through clenched teeth. 

"Crime is what you can't get away with. You have to know that by now." 

"Tell him that. All he sees is 'evil is evil.'"

"Roxxon won't get away with it every time. Settlements can be enough to change evil corporate behavior."

"We don't have to help."

"This is New York, Foggy Bear. Sometimes you settle for a lesser evil."

"Matt won't settle."

"And that's your problem because..?"

"The constant wounded duck look is giving me an ulcer."

Marci blinked. "I know his ego is big enough to crowd that tiny room you two have but, damn. When you fall, you fall hard."

Foggy sighed, leaning his head back to thud it against the elevator wall. It didn't help with the headache, even after the third thud. 

The elevator dinged and the doors slid open. Marci turned to Foggy. "A little blood on your hands doesn't look so bad with a view from the top. You don't see me getting an ulcer because I know the alternative is people like Buck running the world."

Foggy shuddered. "Halloween's next month, but thanks for the scary mental image," he called after her. Marci's laugh slipped through the closing doors, short and sharp, but Foggy wasn't smiling. 

That afternoon, Foggy distracted himself by leaning back in his chair, tossing his lucky softball in the air and then catching it. For two hours.

"Why are we doing this again?"

Matt said nothing. 

Foggy set the softball aside and stared up at the ceiling. 

Twenty minutes later, he still couldn't answer his own question, and Matt wasn't helping. 

But Foggy didn't hear Matt turning pages, either. 

"Is it bad that I don't want our client to win?" Foggy asked. 

Matt winced. Then: "Is the door shut?" he half-whispered. 

"Who cares if they hear us? Roxxon is scum. That's no secret."

"Maybe not, but you still don't want our bosses to hear you disparaging their client."

"You ever wonder what they say about us, behind closed doors?"

"Fogs, I don't think that's the best line of thought."

"And what about the others? Do you think Buck cries himself to sleep? Probably not. Dude has clearly sold his soul."

Matt set down his coffee with a thunk. "We're not here for Buck, or for our bosses."

"Well, I'm certainly not here for Roxxon."

"If we are to fight evil, we need to know its ways."

"You read that in a fortune cookie? No-- what am I talking about? That's clearly a psalm or hymn or something..."

Matt didn't correct him, so Foggy picked up the softball again, rolling it in his hands. After another quiet minute, he looked up at Matt again. Matt hadn't moved, was still facing Foggy with that angry, determined set to his brow. Foggy swallowed. "Matt..."

"I know what you're doing. Stop."

"What?"

"This isn't your fight."

Foggy sat up in his chair and turned to face Matt fully. "What fight are you talking about, exactly? Because we already agreed we're not on Roxxon's side."

"That doesn't mean you can't be the successful lawyer you always wanted to be. You can separate yourself from your work. You can go home, watch a movie, get a good night's sleep. Repeat for a few years and you'll establish a name for yourself, separate from L and Z. You deserve that, Fogs."

"Sure. Now lay out the 'but' already, because I don't think I'm going to like it." 

"You're trying to sabotage your prospects because of me."

Foggy jolted back in his chair. He opened his mouth to rebut, and no words came. Normally, he could extemporize a solid argument, even make a stupid argument sound reasonable. But Matt had just blindsided him. 

Because it was true, he realized. He was being more bitter than his usual sunny self, more combative with his non-Matt coworkers. He'd fought _years_ for a spot at L and Z, and yet he'd just walked out on a meeting without so much as excusing himself. 

"'Because of you?'" Foggy echoed. Matt was right, of course. Defending Roxxon, even by proxy, had been eroding at Matt from the start and, even though Matt was good at hiding his ire from others, Foggy could tell. Matt's body went rigid at some corrosive acid, some layer of slime and filth that coated every inch of the not-gilded marble of Landman & Zack. Going to the gym more and more often was his only way to let off the steam that built up. The righteous anger. When they did go for drinks together all they ever told each other and themselves was a hundred empty reassurances that they could do this, that this was what they wanted. This was what they had worked for. All that study time, all that debt, it was worth it. But, for Matt, everything was more than just white lies to feel better; their behavior was aiding and abetting the corporation, the same corporation that was eating away at their home. 

Matt stood. "I'm leaving," he said. 

"You're..."

"Permanently. I'm going to start my own practice." He moved toward the door as if the decision were as simple as that. Maybe to him it was.

Foggy stood, too, moved to intercept, to place his hand on Matt's elbow. The touch was an odd mirror. "Matty."

Matt paused and turned to face him. He reached for Foggy's hand, hovering over it before finally moving it off his arm with infinite tenderness. "You should stay."

Foggy's voice was low and flat as he repeated. "I should stay at L and Z. Without you."

Matt nodded. 

"That's what your warped sense of righteousness is telling you: That you should go and I should stay?"

Matt didn't quite nod this time. His whole body was taut. 

All the pieces fell into place in Foggy's mind, all the possible paths. Foggy could have been a butcher. He could have served the nice people of Hell's Kitchen in his own quiet way, but instead he was claiming to be one of the good guys while simultaneously working on behalf of filth like Roxxon. Foggy felt like a two-faced Janus if ever there was one: Matt had been recoiling for months against a duplicity Foggy only half-saw. Matt's wounded reaction had been souring Foggy's stomach, and Foggy's instinct had been to take that gall, that bile, and chip away at his own career. 

Credit to Marci where it was due: when he fell, he fell _hard_.

"Foggy, you are the purest beacon of light I've ever experienced, blind or not. I can't ask you to abandon your career over my... feelings." 

"'Can't ask,' or won't ask?" Foggy pressed, setting aside the ridiculous compliment to analyze later. Now was the time for him to let his righteous anger spill out at Matt a bit. "You're telling yourself it'll be easier for you to shoulder the guilt alone if you leave."

Matt swallowed, said nothing. 

"But you're forgetting how much it sucks for me to be abandoned by my best friend. Who always said he'd have my back."

"Sometimes a lesser evil--"

"Bullshit, Matt. Let me make my own choice."

A minute stand-off of silence. Finally, Matt ventured, "Your own choice?"

"You have to offer it to me first, jackass. Say it. Ask."

"Fogs, I can't ask you to--"

"You can ask me to stay here alone, but you can't ask me to join you? You're trying to convince yourself I'll happily live with a fancy-yet-evil job while you strike out on your own. But you know I'd really be missing my best friend and hurting from how he abandoned me. You're somehow okay with that outcome but you're not okay with letting me make my own decision to shoulder the risk with you? Sometimes I wish I could spend a minute in your head, I swear. It's like you'd rather hurt me directly and then feel guilty about it forever than maybe let me be strong through a bad moment at your side."

"That's not--"

"That is how it is. Now ask."

Matt opened his mouth, swallowed, shut his mouth. Then, "Foggy, will you be my partner?"

"Finally. Yes."

Matt took a half-step back. "Oh. ...Okay."

Foggy fished around for a cardboard box. "Good. Now help me pack before I get cold feet over this colossally foolhardy decision we're both too stubborn to realize we made months ago."

"Foggy--"

"No, Matt. No more talking. Pack."

"Yea. Yea, okay."

Marci was the only one they told in person, apart from Mackenzie and Jorge. Every one else received got a short, polite, vague email at 2:17pm on a Tuesday. Everyone but Buck. He'd figure it out eventually. Probably.

"I'd say I'm disappointed," Marci said around an airy grin, "but it's not like I had high expectations in the first place. Good luck, I guess."

"Love you too, Marce." Foggy said, fishing around in the box for the potted plant she'd gifted them when they first moved in. It was a cactus, of course. 

She pushed back his hand with the offered plant. "Keep it. You're going to need something to lighten up your pathetic lives."

"When we're feeling particularly desperate, we'll be sure to call you," Matt said. 

Marci narrowed her eyes at Matt, then tossed her head back and barked a laugh, loud and rich. "Maybe you'll make it after all, Murdock. Maybe you both will. I'll come and visit my cactus. Don't let it die."

Foggy nestled the cactus among the rest of their desk things. All told, they were exiting the revolving doors of Landman & Zack less than two hours after making the decision to leave.

The walked past the sign again on their way out. 

"Tell me," Matt murmured. 

"Come on, Matty," Foggy sighed. "Don't make me do this. I don't want to second guess my decision to follow your crazy, virtuous heart."

Matt cocked a smile that means the world. "You won't," he assured. 

Foggy won't. 

"Fine," Foggy huffed. "It reads 'Landman & Zack.' It's ugly. It's ugly and impersonal. They've shined the letters gold until you could see yourself in them. Well, you couldn't, obviously, but you know what I mean. There isn't a fingerprint out of place; they've scrubbed any human touches away."

Matt hummed, tilting his head as if imagining. Foggy took this as the signal it is to continue. 

"And it's too big. Like, it's imposing, not welcoming. 'We're better than you, that's why you've come begging to us for help,' is what it says."

"And they've hung it too high?" Matt asked.

"Yea. Lucky guess?"

Matt shook his head. "Just seemed like something Landman & Zack and the others would do."

"We were aiming for them," Foggy reminded. 

"Were we?" Matt's voice was cryptic. 

Foggy craned his neck up, up, up once more. "No," he conceded, "No, buddy, I guess we never were. C'mon, let's go find an unpretentious hole-in-the-wall where our suits will make us stick out like sore thumbs."

"I do like the suits," Matt conceded. "We could keep those."

Foggy smiled at the idea. "Hell's Kitchen: Where everybody knows your name and nobody will complain about my fabulous hair." He swapped the cane in Matt's hand for the box full of cactus and bagels. 

"I could get used to that," Matt admitted.

Foggy slung an arm over Matt's shoulder. "Me too, buddy. Me too."

They walked away from Landman & Zack together.

**Author's Note:**

> For the Daredevil bingo prompt "Landman & Zack."


End file.
